The Immigration Department today pledged to speed up its visa issuance procedure for Indonesian migrant workers who have been issued with work permits so that they may return quickly to ease the labour crunch severely affecting industries reliant on foreign labour.

Immigration Department foreign workers division director Jamel Ariffin said today that the Home Affairs Ministry had approved over 150,000 work permits to mainly Indonesian workers but their return had been held back because of delay in obtaining visas.

"The Immigration Department will speed up the visa issuance process so that workers can come back immediately. So far, less than 50 percent of the approved workers had obtained visas," said Jamel during a dialogue session organised by the Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) for industry players in Kuala Lumpur this morning.

The Home Affairs Ministry had set up a special green lane last month to process foreign labour work permits mainly from contractors seeking to replace undocumented workers who departed the country in view of the implementation of strict immigration laws.

In addition to work permits, employers of foreign labour are also required to apply for visas from the Immigration Department and prepare travel and accommodation arrangements for the new workers.

Workers trickling in

According to Master Builders Association Malaysia (MBAM) executive director Chan Fook Cheong, although some 60,000 permits had been approved for construction companies to bring in their workers, the number of workers who have returned is still low because of other documentation requirements.

"We submitted at least 135,000 applications and half of these had been approved. However, only about 3,000 workers have managed to return so far. It takes a month's time to apply for visas and arrange to bring workers into the country," he said when met at the dialogue.

As a result of this, Chan said that work activity at construction sites is still curtailed by labour shortages. "At most sites, there is only about 20 to 40 percent activity," he added.

Asked if any contractors had been found guilty of hiring illegal workers during enforcement raids in the past month, Chan said he was not aware of any such cases.

"We have already warned our members not to hire any more illegal workers," he said.

High success rate

Meanwhile, the CIDB urged for employers to send workers for skills testing so as to enable them to retain relatively experienced foreign workers.

"Now that the government has agreed to extend employment time for foreign workers beyond five years, we urge employers to apply to CIDB to test employees' skills," said the board's deputy executive chief Amir Abdullah.

According to him, more than 9,000 foreign workers have been tested by the board in the last two months.

"The success rate is very high. Only 400 persons failed the test," he revealed, adding that those who failed were required to leave the country.

The CIDB's Skills Accreditation Programme was set up after construction industry employers expressed concern that the country may lose the skills of experienced foreign workers if they are forced to leave Malaysia.

Last week, the government also agreed to extend foreign workers' total stay period from five years to 10 years. After the fifth year, workers will only be allowed work permit renewals if they are able to show proper skills certified by the CIDB.